Inside the 2026 Novacolor Ambassador Bootcamp
Every year Novacolor Italia gathers a group of ambassadors from around the world for what they call the Bootcamp. This May, 18 artisans met in Venice for three days of challenges, and I was one of them.
I want to share what that experience was like, because working with these materials on your own projects for years gives you one kind of knowledge, and working with them under pressure alongside 17 other finishers from around the world, each with their own material language and point of view, gives you something different entirely. I've been doing decorative finishing long enough to know the Novacolor products well, and there is nothing quite like being in a room full of people who know them just as deeply and see them completely differently.
Challenge One: The Mystery Box
The first challenge started with a mystery box. Each of the 18 participants received a different assortment of Novacolor products and one item of distraction that had to be incorporated into the finished sample board. No two boxes were the same, and no one knew what anyone else was working with until the boards were finished.
The range of what came out of that room was remarkable. Every artist interpreted their materials and their distraction item in a completely different way, and seeing 18 boards side by side at the end made it clear that even when you hand the same product line to a room full of skilled finishers, no two people arrive at the same place. My own box included R-Stone Fondo, Zeus Oro, Dune, and Fase Silossanica, with a single leaf as my distraction item. What I built with those materials was one interpretation among eighteen, and that variety was the whole point.
Challenge Two: Teams, Cards, and the Mid-Process Curveball
The three top finishers from Challenge One became team leaders. Each selected five additional members, and the groups worked as teams of six to design six individual panels that would connect seamlessly into one large artistic collage.
What made this challenge genuinely interesting were the challenge cards. Throughout the process, each artist received a card with an instruction that had to be incorporated into their panel or executed in the moment. Some cards changed the composition. Some changed how you were physically working. We added a bold color to our panel three-quarters of the way through, and I had to work with my non-dominant hand for ten minutes. Neither of those things was in the plan.
Adding something bold and unexpected into a composition you have been carefully building as a team is not a small adjustment. It asks you to let go of what you thought you were making and trust that the work can absorb something new. The finished collage was made up of six individual visions that somehow held together as one piece, and that had everything to do with the cards nobody saw coming. It was a wonderful reminder that while each artisan brings a unique style, collaboration can create something greater than the sum of its parts.
Challenge Three: The Real-World Brief
The final challenge placed us in the role of professional designer and applicator together. Each team received a project brief for a real-world space, ranging from a luxury showroom in Dubai to a private residence in Japan to a hospitality project in Marrakesh. We created a decorative panel tailored to the assigned environment and presented our concepts to be judged by a professional architect.
The range of briefs meant that every team was solving a completely different problem, working with different material priorities and different design languages. My brief was the Japanese residence, and I approached it with restraint, choosing Archi+ Argilla for the lower portion of the wall and tinted Dune Opaco for the upper, letting the two materials blend into each other in a soft horizontal transition. Quiet, grounded, and connected to the environment they were designed for.
Watching the other teams present was just as valuable as the challenge itself. The same Novacolor product range, applied to a Dubai showroom and a Marrakesh hospitality space, looks nothing alike. That versatility is something I talk about with designers and specifiers all the time, and seeing it demonstrated under pressure by 17 other skilled finishers made it more tangible than any product sheet ever could.
What I Brought Back
The Bootcamp is a competition, but it doesn't feel like one while it's happening. At some point during the second challenge, with a bold color landing somewhere I hadn't planned for and my non-dominant hand doing its best, the competition part stopped mattering as much as the process did.
What I came back with was a stronger sense of how these materials perform when there is no safety net, a lot of respect for the people I worked alongside, and a reinforced belief in what Novacolor products make possible when artistry, design, and real craft come together. Although this was a competition, it was also an event that allowed us to collaborate, bond, and build together, and to share a passion for these materials in a way that strengthened the Novacolor family as a whole.
Special thanks to Roberta Vecci, Anna Bertaccini, and the full Novacolor team for putting together an event that was worth every moment, and to San Marco Group Spa for the support that makes this kind of gathering possible.
Beth Schafer has spent years working with decorative finishes as both an applicator and a materials specialist. She partners with Novacolor Italia and works alongside distributors across the U.S. to help designers, architects, and professional finishers find the right materials for their projects. For questions or training inquiries, reach her at bethann@novacolornearme.com.